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. [insert condition of choice] awareness day/week/month. I’ve been pondering what we mean by ‘awareness’ and what these events achieve. I don’t want to be naturally cynical. They can be a good focus for fundraising which is never a bad thing. It does make me question what ‘awareness’ itself actually means and whether we need to rebrand and rethink how we share and spread information about specific conditions and illnesses.

Last week, for example, was dementia awareness week, which I’m going to use as an example, but the same points follow in a similar way for Mental Health awareness week, or epilepsy awareness week or breast cancer awareness week. I am by no means saying that these are ‘bad’ things. They aren’t. People need to have a good understanding of the range of issues that are faced by people who have these conditions. For example, concerning dementias, I think it’s really useful to present information about dementias and the way they affect people as well as how we can be moving forward in promoting good dementia care. I have worked in this area for many years and think I’m sensitive to the need to break down attitudes that marginalise people who have dementia. Does an ‘awareness’ week do this? Perhaps. I am of the mind though, that when we advocate ‘awareness’ we are selling ourselves short. Awareness is the easy part. Let’s roll out a few adverts then we’ll have an ‘aware’ population. Or will we? Are we selling ourselves or our issues short when we target these weeks/days/months? Does an awareness week change the minds of anyone who had a prejudicial attitude previously? Or – like ‘NHS change day’ are we pledging to do things we would be doing anyway? And even if we are doing what we would be doing anyway, perhaps doing them en masse or with a public pledge, it focuses our collective minds because that’s part of human nature. Does it allow us to place conditions into boxes and exacerbate stigma – and this is a week for mental health, next week is a week for dementia and then we have a week for asthma without needing to consider the complexities of multiple needs which do not fit into boxes and people who don’t want to be defined or understood on the basis of diagnoses? I don’t have any answers to these questions but that are ones that I ask myself frequently.

I also ask myself what do we want to achieve through awareness? If it’s breaking stigmas, should we direct our efforts in different ways? Will adverts target and highlight issues to people who have prejudices against illnesses they don’t understand? Maybe. Or maybe awareness weeks/days/months are about actually bolstering support, identification and a sense of community for those who are affected by the issue of the day/week/month. Thinking of dementia awareness week, for example, does it, perhaps provide in itself, support and understanding to people who have dementias and their families? A focus on the services provided and some more opportunities to join together and form peer support networks and carer support networks? I didn’t see much of this although, to be frank, I wouldn’t be the person that would be targeted, having neither a diagnosis of dementia myself nor caring for someone with dementia.

I found myself thinking, last week, what difference does ‘awareness’ make? Even if it’s just internal thought processes of one or two people, it’s useful but my concern is that sometimes it can be easy to be complacent and fit conditions into ‘events’ that then drift into the background for the rest of the year. Or we can get ‘awareness’ fatigue. Perhaps we need more awareness of what awareness actually means. I think what I’d like to see is more discussion about what ‘awareness’ means and what outcomes we want to achieve with awareness. Awareness is good. Awareness is useful. Action leading from awareness is, perhaps, better though. Even if the actions are small steps. My fear is that we want to compartmentalise and attach labels. I don’t think there’s any harm in awareness weeks but sometimes I like to think what is the actual aim? Is it awareness or should we be a little more ambitious and have more ‘action’ weeks?